Solar energy ultimately powers the winds, the ocean currents and all the weather systems that affect the planet.  The differences in heating between high and low latitudes, and between land and ocean, create the differences in air pressure and air density that power the winds, the storms, and the jet stream.     

The Earth's surface is continuously radiating heat into space through shortwave radiation.  The sun heats the earth with light.  However, solar heating is much greater in the low latitudes closer to the equator than it is in the high latitudes near the poles due to the steeper sun angles in low latitudes.  Solar intensity also varies with the seasons.  Across the northern hemisphere solar energy is greatest in the late spring and early summer and weakest in the late fall and early winter.  Land surfaces respond differently to heating and cooling than ocean surfaces.  The land will respond to temperature change much more quickly than the oceans, being quicker to warm during the day and in the summer, and quicker to cool at night and in the winter.  The oceans, which absorb a lot of heat energy, are much slower to respond to heating and cooling than the land.

Winds carry colder air south from the polar regions and warmer air north from tropical areas.  As air chills across the north, it sinks and becomes dense, forming high pressure systems that press cold air masses down from the north.  The cold air sinking and mixing with warmer air to the south pro

vides the energy that powers our storm systems.  These storms in turn mix warmer air from the south with colder air to the north. 

The circulations of ocean currents also play a major role in carrying warmth northward and cold southward.  The gulf stream, which is powered by west winds over the north Atlantic, carries a tremendous amount of warm ocean water north.  The amount of water that the gulf stream carries is over a hundred times greater than the flow of all the worlds fresh water rivers combined.  The gulf stream flows north from the Caribbean waters around Florida and the Bahamas, up along the east coast of the United States.  From there it flows northeast into the North Atlantic, passing several hundred miles south of Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, out toward England.  Once the Gulf stream reaches England it splits into two parts.  The Canary current flows south along the European west coast.  The North Atlantic drift flows northeast between Norway and Iceland, cooling and eventually running beneath the arctic ice sheet.  The

zone where the gulf stream rapidly cools and flows beneath the ice sheet is known as the "fram zone". The fram zone is a critical spot in the balance of global climate.  If flow here were to cease, the climate would become so fiercely windy and cold, that much of North America, Europe, and Russia would not be habitable.  The warmth of the gulf stream is released in the polar region greatly modifying the arctic chill.  After the water circulates around the depths of the arctic ocean beneath the ice sheet, it flows back south as cold water becoming the Labrador current.  Most of the water flowing south  runs along the eastern coast of Greenland, but some of the cold water filters around the islands of northern Canada and south along the west coast of Greenland.  From here, the Labrador current passes just east of Newfoundland and then out into the open Atlantic flowing underneath the Gulf Stream, and then fanning out into the depths of the Atlantic.  From here, the water gradually seeps